Erica Synths Pico System III

It uses LPGs and has a sound quite different, more like a buchla than conventional filters.

1 Like

This looks like a really cool box, it’s a shame the controls look super cramped. Would have to play around on one in person to see whether or not it’s still usable.

I know I know but with Buchla you also have rich Oscillators and the pico system may not have that.

btw. the intelligent patch points on the Neutron would let you patch the filter and amp CV like a LPG.

I’ve build a passive lpg for my diy Eurorack and it’s basically an led and a photocell crammed into a flexible shrink pipe, so every time the led gets CV it will light up and the photocell will react to that. without cv there’s no sound coming out! it sounds great and sometimes unpredictable.

I like the price of the pico and the buchla preset cards but a bit more spread out wouldn’t have hurt anyone. :sweat_smile:

1 Like

14 minutes long.

Erica Synths video with lots of sound examples. Plus you get a chance here to consider usability.

2 Likes

Loopop

He makes a custom electronics cards, and talks about options.

4 Likes

Nice gift for xmas, I’ll hint my partner :totes:

Definitely a very tempting, the card repeatability seems awesome

thinking this might actually be a better bet for weird percussion stuff than the DFAM?

Kind of getting tempted by this unit again as I continue to explore with the 0ctrl… seems like it would be a great pair for making some really minimal westcoast techno and just general exploration.

Anyone here end up picking up one of these?

I was sorely tempted and came very close to ordering one at the start of quarantine, but no.

For a lack of a better descriptor, I decided that it didn’t look ‘joyful’ enough. Obvious plus-points aside, in the blurb they say that, “You and all your future generations can spend a lifetime only patching the Pico System III” and that put me off.

On one of the boards, somebody pointed me at Plumbutter instead, which costs a lot more money and it looks wildly pretentious, but it does look fun. It’s gone on the someday pile, and I’ve directed my attention elsewhere for the time being.

Pico III must still be the best value/most convenient modular around, though. Hats off to Erica Synths - they’ve done an amazing thing, making the clubhouse so accessible. I just don’t think this one is for me.

Ended up selling some gear and picking one up, very fun quirky set of simple modules. So far seems great for building sounds to make song around if that makes any sense. Here is my first patch with it. (pairs great with the 0ctrl) off screen is a digitakt looping some samples from it and A4 playing some chord sounds.

2 Likes

new demo ->


I am more convinced to buy this little monster after watching this
5 Likes

A song I am working on with it, A few loops from the Pico in the Digitakt with more pico being mixed in live.

3 Likes

400 euro for the eurorack version on Reverb :see_no_evil:

Tried to show off some more westcoast complex oscillator type sounds from having both oscillators FM modulate each other (one linear one exponential). Only the audio output is heard from the 2nd oscillator. If anyone has some complex oscillator tips (from the tools avaliable on the pico system 3) I would be curious to hear them, probably going to try soldering up some westcoast focused patch cards soon.

3 Likes

Does the Pico III have midi in?

How do you sequence it via Digitakt?

I got a CV OCD to go with it… it is kind of annoying that as a semi modular it doesn’t come with even the ability to clock from midi, but I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend CV OCD to people who have semi modular stuff even with midi built in as it adds a bunch of stuff, like the ability to used locked CC as CV, round robin voice routing for polyphonic or paraphonic play, a bunch of gate triggers and clock deviders. Having a versatile midi CV converter is freaking awesome.

1 Like

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-StkdsYOsc
I am currently researching the Pico III and came across this great video.

4 Likes

this thing is a monster! that’s for sure

I was skeptical since theory but it fills a Buchla gap right between the Op1 and OPZ. :boxing_glove:

great build quality, nice FM/AM possibilities